It starts with the story of a teen from Hunza who ran away from home to join the Dogra army in the early 20th century.
In journalism too there can be deja vu moments! Mine was strikingly geopolitical and yet it came from a childhood towpath I least expected to offer me history. Let’s begin another new chapter of Dogra chronicles!
It starts with the story of a teen from Hunza who ran away from home to join the Dogra army in the early 20th century. Let me share with you how I met this soldier’s descendants in old Jammu city and how through them I met another descendant of a rare forgotten royalty of the Shivalik hills.
These three young men introduced me to the unique warrior traditions of the Himalayan and trans-Himalayan region intrinsically linked with the traditions of Sanghas and Shamanism. But before we go into the detailed story, let us lay out the geopolitical context that makes their collective historical identity a big surprise.
GREAT GAME AND HIGH ASIA
During the Great Game between the British empire and the Russian empire, the northern frontier regions of the Indian subcontinent and the trans-Himalayan tracts became a region of interest for colonial explorers including the Japanese, Germans and obviously the British and the Russians.
The period of mid-nineteenth century witnessed intense geo-politics in this region. For those studying this phase of the Great Game, the meeting between British Captain Franscis Younghusand and Russian Bronislav Grombchevsky at Hunza in1889 signifies the beginning of a particularly new phase of politics in High Asia.
The Russian presence in Hunza happened despite the latter paying a tribute to Dogras in the 1860s after the Dogra military conquered Gilgit. By this time, most of the historical records say that Mir Safdar Khan, the last independent ruler of Hunza had also fled to China in 1886—the British later installed his younger brother Muhammed Nazim Khan as the Mir of Hunza in 1892 when Hunza became a princely state.
The Great Game formally ended in 1907 and around that time the Dogras were already building infrastructure in High Asia. The bilingual inscription of Maharaja Ranbir Singh (1884) from the barracks of Fort Kharpocho in Skardu, Gilgit Baltistan that also mention his Prime Minister, Diwan Anant Ram and son, Prince Pratap Singh can highlight their infrastructure building work in high Asia.
This construction work was continued by Pratap Singh when he became the Maharaja who also visited Hunza in 1910 for the inauguration of a bridge the Dogras built there.
Inspired by the Dogra military, a 14-year-old Basmo Khan, the son of Shah Brat Khan, the Alla Lambardar (head) of Nasirabad, an important town in Hunza revolted against his family and offered himself to the Dogra Maharaja. He got recruited in the Dogra army and migrated all the way from the 13,000 feet of high Asia to the Dogra fortified capital city of Jammu which is at an average 1,000 feet. His brother, Mola Dad Khan continued to live in Hunza.
Basmo Khan later married Ala Rakkhi, the daughter of a wealthy family residing in old Jammu’s historic Mohalla Mastgarh. Ala Rakkhi traced her ancestry to Tajik origins, being a descendant of Kalel Khan, a Tajik who served as a Mughal ambassador in Jammu. Her grandson, Alamdar Muneeb Khan, shared with me that Tajik warriors had been present in the Jammu region since the time of Aurangzeb, gaining prominence in the areas between the Ravi and Chenab rivers.
Basmo Khan and Ala Rakkhi’s descendants continued to live in Mast Garh, on the bank of river Tawi. While Mola Dad’s descendants continued to live in Hunza–an extended family separated by a geo-political distance of hundreds of high altitude miles.
Until 11 years of age I grew up in the old Jammu. My every day was spent in the old city and thus its extensive mesh of narrow alleys linking its many historic neighborhoods were a part of my early education. My primary school was in Julakha Mohalla, a locality adjacent to Mast Garh. While going to play football at Jammu’s Parade Grounds, I almost daily walked through the alleys that led to Afghan mohalla.
Mast Garh and Afghan Mohalla were thus a part of my city vocabulary but I didn’t know that hidden in them was history and the people inhabiting them were living specimens from across the wider regions.
It took me two decades of journalism, much travel and geopolitical comprehension to understand that I grew up in a capital city defined by a very political geography whose historical reality was deliberately ignored by geopolitical narrators.
As I started to discover its stories and the histories of its great warriors and achievers, many unexplored and undocumented chapters from its annals started to disclose themselves to me. Amidst this rekindled euphoria, I met Basmo Khan’s another grandson, Zuhaib Khan in Jammu and was surprised to know that members from the Sheena ethnic community of Hunza were not only present in the military and the society of Dogras but they were the rarest and the rarest of the custodians and the representatives of a high Asian gene pool in the Dogra court.
Their presence and the presence of other Great Game societies like Afghans, Baltis, Bonairs, Yosafai, Gorkhas etc in the Dogra military can characterise the Dogra army and the Dogra Capital as one of the most dynamically designed political capitals of the Great Game times. This narrative obviously comes into play if we decide to write an Indian perspective to the historical Great Game.
Even if we ignore it, we can’t ignore the fact that the Dogra society is far more diverse than ever thought. It’s unknown because it’s largely unexplored, scattered and what’s known is still to be narrated and analysed.
Zuuhaib Khan told me that Mir Safdar Khan didn’t escape to China but died while trying to flee to Bombay. This is difficult to prove through other sources. However it’s very possible because I have met descendants of Central Asian traders in Leh who were travelling on the trade routes from Leh to Himachal to Amritsar and from there to Bombay. This was actually the old route to go to Mecca for Hajj and likely a preferred route by deflectors too.
TRADITIONAL WARRIOR TRIBES
Along with Alamdar Muneeb Khan and Zuhaib Khan, I met Raja Sourav Singh Sarmal, a descendant of the Sauram Kings of the Sarumant line, now known as Sarmal. The name Sarumant signifies “armed with throwing darts and arrows.” This lineage once ruled an independent principality in what is now the Samba region, situated along the present-day international border.
Singh traces his warrior tradition to the Kaal-Vastri (Siah-Posh) warriors, a black-robed warrior code that, according to him, historically spanned from the western Shivalik ranges of Jammu to the central Himalayas. The young descendant proudly describes his clan’s heroic tales heard across various regions of Jammu and Kashmir and beyond.
According to Raja Sourav Singh Sarmal, the widely prevalent tradition of mountain warriors including the Dogra warriors was organized under “Ayudhajivi Sanghas”. Their primary profession was warfare and they formed “tribal hordes.” I understand “Ayudhajivi Sanghas” to be something like the Akhadas of wider Punjab and I comprehend them to be not only skilled combatants but also extremely agile mountaineers.
“Panini, the renowned Sanskrit grammarian, refers to numerous Sanghas as Ayudhajivin (V.3.114-117), meaning those who lived by the profession of arms. In sutra IV.4.14 (Ayudhachchha cha), he defines an Ayudhika as one who earns his living through weaponry (ayudhena jivati),” Singh later narrated to me in a written reply.
Out of the four different warrior Sanghas each of which were governed by specific constitutional framework, Panini had also classified “Sanghas of the Parvata (mountainous regions) (IV.3.91)”.
“Some were aristocratic oligarchies, while others evolved into hereditary rulers— likely ancestors of the Thakkuras and Ranas of the Hill States. Politically advanced Sanghas even exercised sovereign rights, including the issuance of coins,” said Singh.
Each of the warrior groups developed its own lifestyle, possessions, attire and military techniques and weaponry.
“One of the most intriguing remnants of this martial order was the Kaal-Vastri/ Siah-Posh warriors who had shamans to perform the rituals and ask ancestors what to do. These warriors, identified by their black attire, were led by a chief adorned with a silver Nishka (medallion),” said Raja Sarmal while adding that the black uniforms became a symbol of their fierce combat skills.
This thus implies that the tradition of mountain warriors and shamans (called Chelas locally) which continues to exist in some or the other form is ancient in origin. The Raja emphatically claims that the warrior traditions of the hills haven’t all come from Rajputana and that migration has also happened from the hills to what’s today’s Rajasthan.
It is these traditions of warriorship and shamanism that has brought Raja Sarmal, Alamdar Muneeb Khan and Zuhaib Khan together because these three believe in the common roots of their ancestors’ warrior traditions. Shamanism and weaponry continue to be the hallmarks of Shina men in Hunza even today.
Incidentally, I met these men after one of them saw my video about the legendary Dogra General Hoshiyaar Singh who led and fought the battle of Yasin in 1863. We met in the narrow alleys and cafes of Jammu city to share our stories. The three young men, visibly proud of their discovered collective lineage have created Kaliterics, a think tank devoted to preserving the cultural and spiritual legacy of Dogras, Jammu & Kashmir, and the Himalayan territories.
“The ideals of the Kaal- Vastri/Siah-Posh, emphasizing warrior ethics, spiritual wisdom, and political organization, continue to inspire the region’s historical consciousness. Kaliterics ensures that the memory and essence of the Kaal-Vastri/ Siah-Posh, remain alive in contemporary discourse. Thus, from ancient warrior societies to modern cultural revival, it stands as a testament to the enduring martial spirit and rich heritage of the Himalayan people,” said Raja.
REKINDLED INTEREST IN HIGH ASIA
This is for the first time I have met young people in Jammu creating intellectual organizations and thinking and actually working on preserving their heritage. The collective endeavour of these three young men by default takes an historic angle because of their lineages and is as new as the Coffee Cafe culture in Jammu.
The High Asia was never of less interest to humanity— it’s just that since 1947 India’s claim to its high asia heritage has been in doldrums. Maybe the disputed lines not only complicated and militarized the matters but they also cut our access to our own heritage and cut off our geographical connectivity. We were so busy fighting wars, claiming lines and counter operating that we couldn’t claim our own historic endowments. In fact our history also got weaponized.
Many annals of history are still under mist.
While Khan emphasizes that Mir’s larger clan thought he escaped to Mumbai, Raja Sarmal counters it and says that it was Mir’s son, Muzaffar Ali Khan who sought protection from the British which the British Resident in Kashmir denied. “The Political Agent, Gilgit, considers that since Muzaffar Ali Khan has claimed Chinese nationality and at all events has no claim to British protection, there is no reason why he should be permitted to return to India, and that such return would be likely to endanger the security of Hunza state,” said the Resident in a letter dated July 6, 1945.
Keeping in mind the complex involvement of the Colonial British in High Asia politics during the Great Game, the Dogra sources can surely help build an Indian perspective to the geopolitics of that era. An Indian perspective is essential to understand the China-Pakistan alliance in the same regions today. Hope a fresh comprehension on these matters will be followed by reclaiming the civilizational routes to India. Revitalising these routes’ meaning in modern India’s economic vision will be next.
As for the old Jammu city, I wish Khan and his clan start India’s first cafe serving food from High Asia. Maybe they can call it: Hunza Chai! They may serve their authentic tea flavours called Tumoro Tea in Shina language, with their special flat breads called Dirami Fitti. And for Sarmals I wish they re-discover and reintroduce their martial arts. I wish Jammu more people like them.